The Walton High School baseball team has just wrapped up a sensational season.  The Raiders of Coach Shane Amos cruised through the season posting a 32-4 record, 18-1 at Raider Valley, 13-3 in Region play and capped things off by winning the third GHSA state title in school history.

“Our senior class really led the way.  They showed a lot of leadership all season long.  We hit the ball all year long, and played really good defense throughout the season and came to play in the post season.” says head coach Shane Amos.

Among those outstanding seniors are Carter Kieboom who will play next year at Clemson, Parker McCoy who will hit the field for Georgia Tech, and Zak Kristofak  who will play next season for the Georgia Bulldogs.

In the GHSA Finals the Raiders took 2 straight from their region rivals, the Pope Greyhounds, winning game won 11-1,  and then game two 5-4.

“In game one we really hit the ball well, Zak kept us in it and then we opened things up late in the game to take the first one.  In game 2, Chris  pitched a solid game and kept us in it, and then in the 7thinning I just decided to let the players hit a way and see what happened and we came away with a 5-4 win,”  says the coach.

This is the third state title in School history for the Raiders having won in 1992, 2007, and now in 2016, and there was a lot of enthusiasm this week at school.

“It’s been very exciting to come back to school. The student body is really fired up and it’s nice that we are still in school because classmates have been coming by all day to pat my guys on the back and congratulate them on winning the state championship.”

The Raiders are going to lose a lot of talented seniors to graduation, but there is a talented nucleus returning.  “Sure we are losing some talented seniors but we have three juniors and some sophomores to help anchor down the team next year and if we work real hard we should have a shot at playing for another one next year.”

Last year the Raiders came tantalizingly close to achieving all their goals, losing in the championship series to the Parkview Panthers.  It was a long 365 days to wait, but this year it was the Raiders turn.

Coach Amos has been at Walton High School for 28 years and been the head baseball coach for 14 and he is proud about how his players approach the game. “ All my players know how we go about things here at Walton.  They work very hard all summer and fall.  We expect to win.  And our Expectations are high.

And in 2016, those expectations have been achieved as the Raiders add another GHSA Championship prize to their trophy case over at 1590 Bill Murdock Road in Marietta.